How to know if a reverse mortgage is for you
You've probably heard of a Reverse Mortgage, sometimes called a Home Equity Mortgage. With our aging population, they are becoming more common. Reverse Mortgages can be a good way to free-up money to spend on things you want - provided you're aware of the many pitfalls.
What is a Reverse Mortgage?
A Reverse Mortgage enables you to borrow money against the equity you have in your home, up to a proportion of the value of that property.Repayments on the loan are made when you leave the property; that is often when a person sells, moves into a retirement home, or dies.
How much can I borrow?
The lender will calculate the maximum amount you can borrow according to your age and the value of your home. If you're aged between 60 and about 65, you will usually be able to borrow about 20% of the home's value. This proportion increases as you get older, so
that by the time you're over 85 it can be as much as 45% of the house value.
How is the loan paid out?
A Reverse Mortgage loan may be paid out in one of three ways;
- a lump sum, which is great if you are borrowing for a particular one-off purchase;
- small regular payments, which is perfect if your retirement income is not enough to cover your regular expenses. This option is not offered by all companies, however.
- a line of credit or a revolving credit loan.
Would I be eligible?
To be eligible for a Reverse Mortgage, you must own your own home and, usually, be 60 years or older.
Are there other things I should know?
Setting up a Reverse Mortgage can be expensive. You will be required to have your home valued, that will cost around $400. Some companies insist you do this every five years or so which can become quite a sizable on-going expense.
Then there will be set-up fees for the loan. These can vary from around $1000 to $2000 plus legal costs.
What's more, most companies will insist that you keep up with payments for insurance on the home, and that property maintenance is kept to their standard
What about the interest rate?
Be careful! This is where things can get expensive. You do not make regular repayments on a Reverse Mortgage loan. The loan is repaid in full when the home is sold or you no longer have control over it. Your interest rate will be higher than a normal mortgage rate and, as it compounds, you can quickly lose the equity in your home.
So, is it a good idea for me to take out a Reverse Mortgage?
This is a decision only you can make. There are, however, a few things you need to consider;
- Is there some other way to raise the cash you require? Reverse Mortgages are expensive. If the amount of cash required is small such a loan is not worth the cost of the setup fees etc.
- Even for a larger amount of money, it makes better financial sense, if you can afford the repayments, to take out a standard mortgage or personal loan, or free up cash by downsizing your home.
- Find out how portable the loan will be; i.e. if you move home do you have to immediately repay the loan, or can you attach it to your next home?
- Before entering into a Reverse Mortgage (Home Equity Release Mortgage) make sure you seriously consider the effect it may have on your future, especially as regards any move you may wish to make and the capital you'll need to make that move. Also consider how important it is for you to be able to leave something to your children in respect of an inheritance of some sort.
- Some companies offer what is known as a no-negative-equity guarantee which is exactly what is says; a guarantee that ensures that when you sell your home, if you receive less for the home than the value of the outstanding loan, neither you nor your estate will have to make up the shortfall. Get professional advice in this regard if you need it.
- Shop around for a good deal. Make sure you read the contract well and understand exactly what the deal you're offered really means before you sign anything.
- If you're on the pension (and Reverse Mortgage recipients usually are) make sure that receiving funds such as these do not jeopardise the receipt of your benefit.
The Bottom-line:
Reverse Mortgages are not a bad idea, but neither are they necessarily a great idea. If you have an urgent need for cash, e.g. for a surgical operation or the like, then a loan like this can be perfect for your needs. However, make sure you understand the drawbacks. They are expensive, and much of the expense is invisible. That is, it is in the form of interest repayments which are constantly growing without you realising it.
Also, if you have no family and no one you want to leave your home to you may as well spend your money before you go! In that case, a Reverse Mortgage may be perfect for you. However, if you have family or others you are hoping to leave a nest-egg to, beware.
If you have a need for some extra cash, perhaps a better scheme would be for those who you're wanting to leave money to, to take out a loan on your behalf. That way it's like they're making an investment in a property that should increase in value over time.
For more information on home loans, refinancing your loan, or interest rates, contact the team at Futurisk, enquiries@futurisk.co.nz.
Keeping your house warm over winter can be hard. It can cost a small fortune to generate enough heat to get your house warm, and then there are so many ways for cold air to take its place. Luckily there are some affordable and simple ways to keep your house warm this winter that don't require a big budget or a degree in rocket science. Thick curtains are great for trapping your heat inside, and curtains with thermal lining are even better. But if you have only got standard curtains in the house, there are a couple of tricks you can use to maximize their heat retention. Thermal lining can be expensive, but other materials, such as cheap fleece, can be almost as effective. Just line the backs of your curtains with some fleece from your local fabric shop, and you'll be able to see the difference. In fact, you can even use an old PVC shower curtain to do the same thing. And it's not just the windows that need to be covered. Doors are notorious for leaking heat, so putting a curtain over your door might be a good idea too. And why not put a rug or folded towel at the foot of the door to stop your precious heat leaving the room. Opening the curtains during the day is also a good idea. We often think that open curtains during daylight hour means losing all your precious heat during the day, but opening the curtains makes the most of the sun - the most effective and affordable heater known to man. Just make sure you remember to close them when the sun goes down. Closing unused rooms is another effective method to prevent your precious heat being wasted. If you're not intending to use certain rooms for the rest of the day, close the doors. That way your heat stays where you want it to be. Bear floor boards are a welcome invitation for the cold, and account for as much as 10 percent of heat loss. Wooden floors are the worst for leaking heat, but this can be prevented, or at least minimised, by placing rugs and blankets over the floor. This also has the added bonus of keeping your feet warmer too. If you're keen to know how you can further prevent heat loss in your home, get up and walk around on a cold evening. Are there drafts coming from outside? From beneath doors? From between the floorboards? Have a think about what you could do to keep your house warmer this winter without splashing the cash! Reference NZFSG
This information is adapted from Consumer Magazine (January/February 2006, Issue 455, Page 23). There’s something every person who uses a bank needs to understand—a bank is a business. It exists to make a profit and it does that by maximising the use of your hard-earned cash. Knowing how they do that could save you money. Here are six things your bank will never tell you:
Credit card can be dangerous! Many people in New Zealand today find themselves buried by inescapable debt that can be traced back to being overzealous in the use of their credit card. S ure, credit cards are handy. They provide an easy way to purchase things online or if you don't want to carry cash around with you, but it's so easy to forget when you buy something with your card, you are incurring a debt. And, once you get into credit card debt, it can be very difficult to get out of. That's why the team at Futurisk want to remind you of the six credit card traps you need to watch out for:
The team at Futurisk have three rules regarding personal finance: Spend less than you earn Pay off debt Don't go into debt This article expands on those rules - do these nine things and you need never worry about your finances again.
Life insurances can be pretty confusing. There are so many products out there, and you never quite know which ones are best for you. And then, having decided on the type of insurance, there's the question of how much should you insure for? And when should you start with life insurance? One thing is for sure, however, living without any form of life-based insurance cover leaves your personal and business finances in a dangerous position. One of the most common ways of falling into debt is through the unexpected need to replace a lost or damaged asset that was not insured, and your greatest asset is your ability to earn. If that was suddenly removed from you, debt could quickly follow.
If we were buying a new appliance or vehicle, we'd shop around. If we wanted some new computer gear or were renovating our kitchen, we'd look for the best deal. So why don't we do that with insurance? I t seems many New Zealanders think of insurance as coming in a fixed package at a fixed price, but there are some practical things you can do to save money on your insurances. Here are six hot tips.
Earlier this year this was a glitch with ANZ’s payment system, and a whole lot of New Zealanders woke up on payday to discover they hadn't been paid. It didn't take long for the issue to be resolved, and everyone was paid by lunchtime, but the ANZ Facebook page was still inundated with complaints and tales of tragedy as people claimed they were now starving, cold and unable to put petrol in their car because of ANZ’s mistake. If you woke up on payday and found yourself in this situation, what would your day be like? Would you be going to work hungry because you couldn't afford to buy food for lunch? Would you have to walk to work because you had no money to pay for petrol or a bus? Or would you just transfer a few dollars from your emergency account and go on your merry way? For many, waking up on pay day to find their account empty should be a wake-up call, and one of the best things you can do if you’re scared of ever being in this situation is to create an emergency account. Most financial gurus and advisers these days recommend having a separate account that’s just for emergencies, and they’re not hard to set up. In fact, most banks will let you do it online. Just log in to your banking website and create a brand new internet account. But having the account is only half the job – now it just needs some money. Because many people live from pay day to pay day, putting a couple of hundred dollars aside into your emergency account is much easier said than done. Instead, consider starting an automatic payment, so every week or fortnight even as little as $5 is transferred into your emergency account without you having to do anything. $5 doesn't sound like much, but within 10 weeks you’ll have more than enough to put petrol in your car and buy some lunch if your pay doesn't come through. One of the key pieces of advice given about keeping an emergency accounts is to make it a little harder to access than your regular accounts. If you had a card in your wallet that had access to your emergency account, the temptation to spend the money would be too great. Instead, make it so that the only way to access that money is to have to transfer it from the special account into your regular account. So next time you need some emergency cash in a hurry, all you’ll need to do is whip out your smartphone, transfer some money and you’ll be away laughing.
There are a number of key things to remember when driving a car: always put on your seat belt, give way to traffic on the right, and make sure you've read the fine print of your insurance policy documents. These days you’d have to be pretty foolish to drive around without insurance. Damaging your car, or even worse, someone else’s, without insurance is a fast-track to debt. But something so many drivers forget is that even having insurance is not always a get-out-of-jail-free card. Your insurance policy will have so many special clauses and exclusions to give your insurer all they need to deny your claims, and put you out of pocket. Here are a few key exclusions to remember.
I remember when I was about Intermediate School age (a long time ago), my mother would give me $20 each fortnight and I’d take it to the local building society. It was the mortgage money. Having taken out a mortgage, my parents faithfully paid back the required sum every fortnight until every dollar of the interest and principal were paid off. No thought was given to ways of saving on those mortgage repayments. These are, however, simple things you can do to speed up your mortgage repayments saving you both money and time. Here are Futurisk’s six tips to help pay off your mortgage faster:
Sometimes it’s easy to feel like insurance is a waste of money, particularly if we’ve never made a claim. Before you get to thinking this way, however, remind yourself what insurance is for. When we purchase insurance, we’re purchasing a product. It’s like when we pay for groceries or petrol or a new television. In the case of insurance, we’re buying protection for our assets and for our financial future. A simple fact of life is this, unfortunate things happen. These things happen when we least expect them, and often catch us completely by surprise. In New Zealand today, one of the most common ways people fall into debt is through the unexpected need to replace a lost or damaged asset that was not insured. Here’s a general rule to bear in mind: anything you need for day to day living, which you could not replace with cash if you lost it, needs to be insured. In general, that boils down to three things: your home, your house contents, and your vehicle.
ANZ
AIA
NIB
Partnerslife
Southern Cross
Perpetual Guardian
Westpac
Vero
FANZ
Under the new financial advice regime rolled out on 15th March 2021, we are required to provide publicly available information on our company. Click here for our company information.